


don't have to be cool

by wildcard_47



Category: The Terror (TV 2018), The Terror - Dan Simmons
Genre: 'We Keep Tripping Over Our Furniture' Kiss, Awkward First-Date Kiss, Kissing Meme, M/M, Passionate kiss, Unexpected Kiss, is this a kissing fic?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-03
Updated: 2019-03-03
Packaged: 2019-11-08 21:30:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 2,683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17988866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wildcard_47/pseuds/wildcard_47
Summary: Kissing drabbles, taken from that 50 types of kisses meme floating around tumblr. Lots of Fitzier, but Franky and other ships abound and will be added!





	1. unexpected

Although it had been two weeks since John Irving, walking alone near the east ridge, had sighted a group of Netsilik and convinced them – somehow, God only knew how – to return with him to Terror Camp, many of the sickest men were still abed. 

It was understandable, really. The men needed more than small amounts of fresh meat. They needed rest. Time to grieve the brothers they’d lost. And time to gather their strength for the days ahead.

Sitting in the joint captains’ tent next to a sleeping James’s bedside, Francis knew, although he had not yet voiced it to another soul, that they would also need to walk again before the summer was out.

And it was while he was ruminating over this prospect that a small bit of biscuit suddenly hit him in the temple.

“What the – ”

Turning, he caught James’s eye. James, who was very clearly awake, and who had assumed a very innocent face. 

Even lying on a cot in his weakened condition – eyes bloodshot, still flushed with fever, and unable to walk for more than a few minutes at a time – the man still managed to smirk at him as he met Francis’s puzzled gaze.

“Don’t brood,” he rasped.

Francis felt one corner of his mouth twitch up. “What?”

James shook his head slightly, but he was still smiling, even as Francis saw the exhale that indicated this was slightly painful. “You’ll get lines in your face.” 

He gestured to his jaw with a flick of his fingers, barely lifting them from the blankets. 

Upon putting the joke together, Francis let out a cackle that shocked him in its intensity. “Bollocks. You got those from grinning at all your ridiculous stories.”

“Well.” James smiled again, wider this time. “’Twas worthwhile, then.”

Laughing even harder, ducking his head, Francis felt the relief of their present situation wash over him all at once. A sudden surge of gratitude pulsed through his chest at the idea that James was still here, and still smiling, and could in fact tell his stories for many days more. 

Or even throw weevil-filled biscuits at his face.

“Francis?”

Glancing up, Francis met James’s inquisitive gaze – recalling how warm and sharp and _fragile_ the man’s broad shoulders had felt under his gloved palms at Victory Point, how intensely they’d stared at each other, how he wanted James to look at him that way every minute – and suddenly he was leaning forward, heedless as a besotted schoolboy, cupping James’s face in two hands and kissing him as soundly as he could.

It was only when James made a soft protesting noise against his mouth that he pulled back.

Panting, stunned, Francis had no idea what to say next, but surely James had one last bon mot saved for such a strange occasion. He would make some sort of gently amusing comment, they might very possibly laugh at such foolishness together, and that would be the end of it.

James only stared. And stared. And stared. Mouth slightly open, eyes wide with shock. He stared at Francis until the lingering silence between them became unbearable, and Francis finally had to avert his eyes, and scratched awkwardly at one side of his beard.

“Erm. If you – James, I – I’ll not presume to – ”

He was prepared to make his excuses and retreat with as much of his shattered dignity as was humanly possible when something much more solid than a piece of biscuit boffed him in the forehead.

It was James’s glove.

“What the hell was that for?” Francis demanded as he batted it away, head snapping up to scowl at his Second.

“You’re brooding again,” said James very evenly. A flush of colour had risen in his cheeks. “Don’t.”

“Oh,” murmured Francis in a whisper.

And then James slipped his bare hand into Francis’s – squeezed his fingers tightly – and the penny dropped.

_“Oh.”_

“Stay a few minutes, Francis,” said James, and squeezed Francis’s fingers again, even as he shut his eyes. “I daresay I’ll not mind your giving me additional crow’s feet, if it means you’ll try that again in the morning.”

“You’re an _idiot_ ,” growled Francis after a small pause, but he was also blushing, and he stayed anyway.


	2. awkward first-date kiss

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: an awkward kiss given after a first date.

James had been surprised when Francis had accepted his dinner invitation without reservations, and had been even more surprised when the evening had gone off without a hitch. There’d been no tossed-off insults – not genuine ones, anyway – nor bouts of sulking, nor anything resembling the clear annoyance Francis had once shown at sharing his company, in the early days.

It was so new, this strange and tentative flirtation now blossoming between them, even after more than a year of actual friendship. If you’d asked James two years ago whether he’d be sharing a heaping bowl of pasta and a serving of tiramisu with his most frustrating colleague in the department – and deliriously enjoying Francis’s company to boot – he might have assumed you were trying to trick him.

By the time they had left the restaurant, and were walking back toward the nearest metro stop, the pleasure buzzing in James’s chest had reached previously-unfathomable levels. 

He stopped at the gate of a particularly beautiful apartment garden without saying a word – so quickly, in fact, that it left Francis a step ahead on the pavement, still snorting over the misspelled street sign from two blocks earlier.

“Oh, have you seen another? Is it worse than _pubic facilities_?”

Francis’s blue eyes gleamed beautifully under the soft streetlight, and his crooked smile showed off the gap in his teeth, and when this enticing picture was paired with the gentle tap of his hand against James’s elbow as he walked up to join him by the gate, James found he could not resist leaning in and capturing Francis’s mouth in a heated, rather long kiss.

Although Francis leaned into the kiss for several seconds, he also pulled back rather suddenly, staring at James as if he’d just spouted off a round of Portuguese curses.

“What – what was that for?”

“I don’t know,” said James after a small pause, and released Francis’s arm. “Just, ah, wanted to. End of a good date.”

Francis shifted on his feet, narrowed his eyes. “Date.”

“Yeah,” said James, with dawning horror. “You – you did know that’s why I asked you to dinner. On a Saturday night. And paid for both of us. That’s – did you really not think we were on – I mean, that it was one?”

From the way Francis blanched, and his mouth suddenly dropped open, he did not.

“Shit.” James was momentarily lost for words. His heart had dropped somewhere into his intestines. “Well. That explains the surprise.” He jammed his hands into his jacket pockets. His knees were shaking. “Sorry. You just – looked sexy, and I thought the evening was going well, so I wanted to – ”

“Sexy?” Francis whispered.

“Yeah. I’m sorry. I’ll just – see you Monday, or whatever. I’ll go now.”

“James.”

Sighing, James looked up. He still had not moved one whit.

“I am surprised,” said Francis in a rush, still barely meeting James’s eyes, “but that doesn’t – I mean – you can do. Again.”

“What?”

“If you wanted to – whatever – then you – you can do.”

James actually laughed, stung by such reticence. “Christ, Francis, stop being so bloody opaque! You didn’t even _know_ we were on a date five minutes ago. And now you’re gawping at me as if I’ve lost my mind entirely! For god’s sake, man, if you honestly want me to stay, or to kiss you, or do anything else other than go home and drown myself in the bath out of sheer hideousness, then you’ll have to say something a bit more articulate than _whatever,_ else I’ll toss you into this chap’s garden and slap the living daylights out of – ”

Judging by the speed in which Francis grabbed James’s lapels and yanked him forward into a heated, almost embarrassingly-passionate embrace, the answer to whether he wanted a second kiss was very clearly yes.


	3. passionate kisses

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: one person stopping a kiss to ask “Do you want to do this?”, only to have the other person answer with a deeper, more passionate kiss.

Francis and James had ended up in the teacher’s lounge during the long-awaited year eight dance – a dance where they were officially supposed to be chaperoning the punch table for the PTA.

Instead of breaking up idiot children who attempted to bump and grind to awful rap music, or the sneaks who tried to spike the punch with peppermint schnapps four times, they’d ended up sneaking off and drinking terrible weak tea in the dimly-lit lounge, cracking jokes about all the private notes and student projects and odd things they found in drawers.

By the time they’d moved to the lumpy sofa, a familiar tune rang out from the open gymnasium and all the way down the hall. The faint techno beat sparked a delighted noise out of James’s mouth before he could censor himself.

“Ooh, I requested this one! They’re actually playing it!”

Francis listened visibly, frowning, but choked back a snort when he finally figured out what, precisely, was now playing.

“Jesus Christ, James. Those kids don’t know Orchestral Manoeuvers in the Dark were even a real band! They’ll think you’re pranking them.”

“Who cares! I wanted to hear it,” pouted James, slapping at Francis’s knee. “When I was an eighth year, this was the _most_ romantic song for a slow dance.”

“Didn’t you end school in the heyday of terrible boy bands?”

“No. I’m not that young.” James was already lunging forward on the sofa to shove at Francis’s shoulders; Francis just cackled in response. “And you’re ancient, so shut up.”

After several minutes of play fighting, the music swelled; a low crooning voice could now be heard: _I touch you once, I touch you twice, I won’t let go at any price…_

James’s hands stilled on Francis’s shoulders just as they realized he was practically sitting in Francis’s lap – and suddenly James was leaning down to kiss Francis, soft and tentative at first, and then with more feeling. They kissed until they were breathless, James’s elbows bracketing Francis’s head on the sofa cushion and Francis grasping his suit jacket in two taut fists.

And then Francis pulled back with a gasp.

“James, are – are you sure you want to do this?”

James wanted to make a joke at first – _it’s only a kiss, we’re not bloody eloping_ – but after seeing the fraught expression on Francis’s face, he thought better of it.

Quietly, he pressed his lips to Francis’s pulse point, feeling all the tension leave and then re-enter the Irishman’s body as he slowly dragged his mouth upward, peppering Francis’s neck and jaw with little kisses.

“Don’t stop,” huffed Francis just as James reached his mouth again, stroked one craggy cheek with a reverent finger, and captured his pink, parted lips in a searing kiss, rolling his hips forward with a groan as his body yearned for more.

Ten minutes later, they were caught necking by the lead thirteen-year-old hall monitor, given a strict lecture along with what she termed  _parent demerits,_ and promptly kicked out of the dance and all future school functions by the head of the PTA _._

Worth it.


	4. danger ahead (franky)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: kisses exchanged as they move around, hitting the edges of tables or nearly tripping over things on the floor before making it to the sofa, or bed.

“Fuck me,” hissed Tom as they stumbled through the front door with a whimper, pawing at each other’s clothes. 

Still kissing him, hands tangled in wavy salt and pepper hair, Francis couldn’t tell whether this was an instruction or just encouragement, but he didn’t bloody care as long as he could get the Yorkshireman down onto a flat surface within the next twenty seconds.

Yanking at shirtfronts and trouser buttons as they kissed, cursing up a storm as they knocked over a floor lamp, then bumped into one corner of the flatscreen, Francis decided they needed to burn all their furniture in the morning, else they’d bloody impale themselves on a table leg before the night was out.

Growling, he pulled away and ripped Tom’s button-down open; two pearl buttons flew into the coffee table and skittered away to secret corners as he leaned forward and kissed the man again. Tom groaned against his lips in response, opened his mouth to feel that first electric swipe of Francis’s tongue.

“Mmph,” he rumbled as he pulled away. “Tha’s my fuckin’ best shirt, you twat.”

“Don’t bloody care,” Francis hissed, sinking his teeth into Tom’s lower lip and pulling fiercely at it before kissing him properly again. 

After several seconds, he guided the man back towards the sofa. He was fairly certain he’d stubbed his toe in the process of walking, but couldn’t feel a damn thing as he pushed Tom backwards, and stumbled down onto the cushions, balanced on one knee. 

“Get naked. Want to suck your cock.”

Tom landed on his rump on the sofa with a grunt, belt askew, collared shirt now barely covering his shoulders and forearms, and undershirt rucked up to expose his lean bare stomach. “Christ, you’re hot for it, eh?”

“Yeah,” groaned Francis as he tossed his own shirt onto the ground, and knelt down between Tom’s spread legs in earnest. “Yeah.”

Chuckling, the Yorkshireman leaned forward, kissed Francis with gusto, and sucked on his tongue for a thrilling few seconds before pulling back with a huff of breath.

“Shirt’s off, then, love. Show us what ye’ve got.”


	5. tearful kisses

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Prompt #39: Kissing tears from the other’s face

The mood was sombre as they picked their way back into the former Hospital Camp. Lady Silence – Silna, now – led the way, walking ahead with her efficient sled, stopping only to examine practical objects that might be used for trade, or to keep a piece of detritus from flying away into the plain.

Behind her, James and Francis moved more slowly, unable to bear the sight of the things they’d carried now strewn so haphazardly across the gravel – lost – proven useless to the people who had needed them most.

Unable to comprehend the number of bodies who lay dead almost exactly where they’d fallen, outside the sick tents or within. All contorted in the most terrible and pitiful positions. All men they had loved and known as brothers.

When Francis stopped walking, and reeled backwards from a figure who was lying face-down in the shale just outside a tent, James merely assumed it was because some animal had perhaps gotten to the poor man first. But when Francis grasped blindly behind him for James’s arm with his remaining hand – a terrible sob wracking his reduced frame – James saw why this sight so affected him.

Here in his nightshirt, with his once-perfect hair in disarray, reaching with one wasted arm outstretched for some unknown prize, lay Thomas Jopson.

“Oh, Thomas,” breathed Francis, and sunk to his knees in front of his steward’s lifeless body, tucking the lad’s dark hair behind one ear as tenderly as if he were a babe in arms. “I – ‘m so sorry.”

Swallowing the lump of tears in his own throat, James slowly knelt down next to the _Terror_ Captain – for even without his flagship, Francis still bore all the burdens of that office and innumerable others – and offered silent comfort in the only manner he knew how.

“I should’ve b – been here.” Francis sagged sideways into James’s outstretched arms with a ragged breath. “James, I should’ve – he – he needed – ”

“If you were here, you would only have perished with them.” The kiss James pressed into Francis’s furrowed brow was meant to be reassuring. Once he did this, he found he could not stop, kissing the bridge of Francis’s nose, then tilting up his bearded face to kiss away saltwater tracks from the apples of his cheeks and the sides of his trembling mouth, even as more tears continued to fall. “Jopson wouldn’t have wanted that, hm?”

“No,” whimpered Francis, even as James kissed away a fresh wellspring of tears from one corner of his closed eyes, his lips brushing against damp lashes and impossibly soft skin. “No. I just – ”

“I know, Francis.” Over Francis’s head, James could glimpse Silna studying them a few meters off, solemn and clear-eyed, clearly giving the man a moment to excise his grief despite the cold and the time constraints and the need to continue walking. “I know.”


End file.
